


Time Enough for Mourning

by SassySnowperson (DramaticEntrance)



Series: Merrick/Draven [3]
Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Grief/Mourning, Hope, M/M, Those two tags really go together with this fandom don't they
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-04
Updated: 2018-01-04
Packaged: 2019-02-28 02:10:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13261413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DramaticEntrance/pseuds/SassySnowperson
Summary: Draven lives, Merrick doesn't.“Why are you even here?” Blue Eight asked, spite and grief filling his voice to equal measure. “You hated the guy.”Draven kept his face impassive. “Antoc Merrick was a skilled pilot and a fine officer. The Rebellion is poorer for his loss. He deserves to be remembered.”





	Time Enough for Mourning

**Author's Note:**

> In response to a lovely Anon on tumblr who asked, "do you Draven actually mourned Merrick and if so, how?"
> 
> I suspect they did not know the can of worms they were opening. 
> 
> Thanks to [Aeshna](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Aeshna/), who did not so much encourage me to write it as know immediately that I was going to, and sat there to help me figure it out.

* * *

Davits Draven didn’t mourn at the wake. He tried. For Merrick’s sake, he tried. 

He tried to ignore the glares and mutters as he walked in. The animated story about some regulation Merrick had utterly failed at enforcing petered out as Draven put the bottle of alcohol he had brought down with the rest. 

“Why are you even here?” Blue Eight asked, spite and grief filling his voice to equal measure. “You hated the guy.” 

Draven kept his face impassive. “Antoc Merrick was a skilled pilot and a fine officer. The Rebellion is poorer for his loss. He deserves to be remembered.” 

The lines around Blue Eight’s jaw set with disgust. “Could have said that while he was alive.” 

Draven slipped out shortly after. From the hallway he heard the sounds of laughter, of the wake picking back up again.

* * *

Draven placed the four reports next to each other, eyes flicking from one to another in some futile hope that they would reveal Princess Organa’s location, where the bloody Death Star plans had gotten to. It was his officer that had gone rogue, his job to pull solutions from the wreckage. 

His job to make sure Andor’s sacrifice hadn’t been in vain. 

Andor’s sacrifice and...others. 

His door slid open, and Draven looked up, irritation at being disturbed radiating out of him. That faded when he saw the gaunt lines of exhaustion on Colonel Bandwin Cor’s face. Cor was one of the few people who may have had a worse time of things in the past few days. As the head of Starfighter Logistics and Merrick’s right hand man (‘Former,’ Draven thought before his mind skittered away), Cor had been left with a fine mess to wrangle. 

“Colonel.” 

“General.” Cor’s nod was brief. “I have some business with you.” 

“Don’t worry.” Draven shoved some of his thinning blond hair off of his forehead. “I’ll not be bothering your pilots further.” 

Cor gave a soft grunt. “I knew Merrick. Knew his habits.” Cor approached Draven’s desk. “You two were circumspect, but not that secretive.”

Draven’s stomach churned, bile rose in his throat. He fought it down, arched an eyebrow as he considered Cor. 

Cor laid a small datastick on the desk. “From the General,” Cor said. Then, he produced a medium-sized bottle of Corellian Brandy. “From me. I’m sorry for your loss.” 

Grief slammed against the cage of his ribs, and Draven refused to let it out. He picked up the datastick. “What—” he stopped himself, froze when he heard the sharp crack to his voice. He waited for the emotion to blunt before trying again, “What is this?”

Cor said, gently, “I don’t know. I just had instructions to deliver it...in the event. To you.”

Draven’s thumb traced the outside of the stick. “Thank you,” he said, the edge of sandpaper back in his voice. 

“Of course.” Cor turned to leave. He paused, his back to Draven. After a moment he said, “He was a better man. Because of you.”

“I doubt that.” Draven stared down at the datastick. 

“I don’t.” Cor took another step toward the door, stopped, then said, “And neither did he.” 

With that, Cor left, leaving Draven alone with the bottle and the datastick. 

Draven might have said he wasn’t certain why his hand was shaking when he plugged the datastick into his holoprojector, but that would be a lie. A flickering blue holo sprang up, and there was Merrick, rumpled hair and a face full of laugh lines, staring back at Draven. 

“Hey, Dav,” the holo said, and Draven lurched forward, jabbed it off, let the picture fade away. 

He didn’t drink himself into oblivion, mourning Merrick with the bottle of Corellian Brandy. For his own sake, he didn’t.

* * *

He almost mourned Merrick as the Death Star bore down on Yavin and there was nothing left to do but watch. But he didn’t. He tucked the datastick in his pocket and wrapped his fingers around it, letting some of Merrick’s relentless optimism seep into his palm as a some backwater wonder blew up the Emperor's weapon. 

Then he sat down and figured out how to get the Rebellion off of Yavin, because all the celebration in the world didn’t change the fact that the Empire knew where they were. 

He didn’t mourn as they left Yavin, left Home One, left Vrogas Vas, left endless bases and pit stops trying to stay one step ahead of the Empire. He was too busy trying to coordinate the information the Rebel Alliance needed. Too busy trying to build on the momentum from the Death Star’s destruction. 

There was a moment, on Hoth, when he thought he’d mourn. General Airen Cracken, his wayward superior, showed up with a flourish and a string of Outer-Rim contacts. Draven ceded power to Cracken as efficiently as he could and felt a little bit of the responsibility slide from his shoulders. Cracken patted Draven’s back, told him good job, and gave him forty-eight hours off. 

Draven retreated to his room, stared at the ceiling for five minutes before the weight of Merrick’s memory pressing in was too much. He pulled the bottle out of his go-bag, where it lived in his left shoe, next to his spare uniform and toiletries; life that could be grabbed in a hurry when everything else was lost. It was perhaps frivolous, to keep something so personal in a bag of essentials, but Draven wasn’t willing to let it go. The datastick wasn’t in his go-bag. It hung on a cord around his neck, nestled next to his heart. 

Draven very carefully didn’t think about the sentimental implications of that. It was the best way to keep something safe with his constantly-mobile life. Now, his first moment of quiet in years, he took the cord off of his neck, sat down next to the holoprojector, bottle in hand. 

His comm chimed. Cracken’s voice echoed through it, “I’m sorry, General, but one of your operatives in Coyerti is checking in, and I need you to coordinate.” 

“Of course. Be right there.” The unopened bottle went back to his bag, the cord back around his neck, and the responsibility back on his shoulders.

* * *

Draven didn’t mourn with the slide of sweat-drenched bodies, with skin under his teeth and salt on his tongue. He didn’t mourn with hair tangled through his fingers, with limbs wrapped around his own. 

That had never been the most important part of who Merrick was to him, anyway.

* * *

Luke Skywalker, lit by some inner passion, stalked his way into Draven’s office, telling him off for a call that had burned an agent. “We have to be better than them!” Luke said, golden face screwed up with anger, “Otherwise what’s the point!” 

“The point is that you don’t send good credits after bad. Agent Lew understood that.” 

“I could have gotten them out!” Luke said, full of bravado and sacrifice.

“Dismissed, Lieutenant,” Draven snapped, harsher than he had intended to. 

Luke made an inarticulate noise of frustration and stormed out of the office again. Draven pressed his palm against where the datastick hung under his shirt and nearly mourned.

* * *

“Sir, I can get there in time.” There was heartbreak in his agent’s voice. “Please, Sir, I just need to take a speeder.” 

“It’s too big of a risk,” Draven said, long habit making the words come easily. “Pull back.” 

“Sir, they’re children.” 

Draven almost snapped at him for insubordination. Draven almost tore him to shreds for daring to countermind orders. 

“Securing the data is your priority. After that—I’ll authorize the speeder use.” 

“Sir.” The agent sounded breathless. “Yes, Sir. I’ll...it’s been an honor.” 

“May the Force be with you.” Draven managed to get out, grateful there wasn’t anyone else on the comm line. 

As the line cut off, Draven ran his fingers under his collar, finding the cord around his neck.

* * *

Endor happened, the Emperor was neatly dead, and while some danced in the firelight Draven studied the hierarchy of Imperial Command. No Empire died easily. 

Jakku happened, it was a mess, but for the first time Draven could believe that the Empire had been struck a fatal blow. 

Chandrila happened, the Galactic Concordance was signed, and it was over. 

Supposedly. In the shadows Draven lived the war was never really going to be over. Draven shook his head at the idealists shooting off fireworks, believing that signatures and handshakes would actually make a difference. 

The datastick around his chest suddenly felt very heavy.

Draven pulled out his go-bag. The bottle was still there, tucked into his left shoe. He pulled it out, set it on the low table of the living room as celebration flickered outside his window. Draven found a holoprojector and a cup, set them on either side of the bottle, and sat down heavy on the couch. 

Hands steady, he opened the bottle and poured himself a glass. He took a sip, aromatic and excellent, only improved with age. Draven breathed in and out, slowly through his nose, and reached for the cord around his neck. With a shaking hand, he plugged the datastick in. 

Unchanged by years, the impish face of General Antoc Merrick sprang into being. “Hey Dav,” the figure said. 

Draven’s hand spasmed around his cup. This time, he let the holo play. 

Merrick’s flickering blue figure swallowed, seeming to gather his thoughts, "So, Cor is giving this to you in case I die and you don't. Which we both know is the likely outcome. I’m not hoping for it, mind you…” Merrick trailed off, shaking his head slightly as he came back to himself. “Don't worry. This isn't a love confession or anything like that." 

Merrick looked off to the side, something crinkling the corners of his eyes. "Kriff, could you imagine. That'd be terrible. Wouldn't do that to you. No, I'll say something like that in person or not at all." 

The figure of Merrick went slightly blurry until Draven blinked, wet tracks down his cheeks. 

“Anyway, we have our ups and downs. I just...felt the need to have this out there. In case we ended—I ended—on one of those downs.” Merrick chewed at his lip, moustache twitching the way it always did when he was lost in thought. “I’ve never liked your methods.” Merrick said, looking straight at the holorecorder. “You’ve driven me crazy from the start.” 

Draven huffed a wet laugh, taking a sip of the brandy. 

“But, Dav, I’ve never doubted the world you’re trying to build. I’ve never doubted that we’re trying to build the same world. If I don’t make it, and you do, I think you should know that. I trust you with the future. I think it’s in good hands, even if I’m not helping with the building anymore.” 

Draven’s eyes closed in a hard blink, and he forced them open again, not wanting to miss a moment.

“As much as I’ve hated your approach...I know it’s needed. You’ve made me a better soldier, you know. Able to make the hard calls. To see the realities of the situation.” Merrick sighed, his shoulders slumping a little. “This is going to be a hard war, and we’re going to need all our skills. Including yours.” 

Merrick looked back up, something pleading on his face. “But, Dav, we can’t sink to their level. We can’t sink to their mindset. I know you’ll never admit it, but I made you a better person. Reminded you that not everyone sees the world as a ledger.” 

In the privacy of his empty room, Draven felt the truth slip free, “You did.” 

Merrick’s figure held his palm up, quiet entreaty. “Don’t forget that, please. Remember it.” 

The palm dropped, and Merrick straightened, aura of command surrounding him. “Don’t give up the fight. Don’t let them win. Remember the future we’re fighting for.” 

Merrick swallowed, going silent, and Draven felt a sob shake through his chest as Merrick reached for the holorecorder. His hand stopped, and he looked at the camera again, eyes somehow finding Draven’s across the years. The command dropped off of his voice, and all that was left was Antoc, slight smile and a knowing gaze as he said, “You once said you wouldn’t mourn me. But please, remember me.” 

The figure cut off, and Draven was left staring at a holoprojector on a table. One choking sob made its way out of his chest. Then another and another. He set down the glass of brandy, worried he’d spill it in his shaking as he sobbed, all grief and fury, staring at the place where Merrick used to be. 

As his weeping grew less violent, the glitter of an explosion outside his window caught his eye. He looked over, breath shaking, and he heard the strains of celebration going on outside his door.

Draven unplugged the datastick, tucked it back over his head and under his shirt. He walked out of his room, out of the building, and into the streets teeming with joy. He turned his tear-stained face toward the light, and he remembered. He celebrated. He mourned.

**Author's Note:**

> Come feel sad about these two with me for a little while. ( _and then get inspired to write Everyone Lives AUs with them_ ) (*hopeful eyes*)
> 
> Thank you for reading, spending some more time with me and this ridiculous rare pair.
> 
> If you'd like to chat, [I’m on Tumblr!](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/sassysnowperson)


End file.
